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My fantasy game of choice is The 9th Age but we have a reasonable size fanbase of AoS players locally so i figure why not. I'm a casual player so not looking to go too competitive and initially just something small like a 1000 points - small enough I can paint it before we come out of lockdown and get play games again. AoS feels very... prog rock album cover to me... so there's only three armies that grab my interest.

1. Idoneth Deepkin - I have a love of sea monsters and these guys pique my interest. Disappointed they are sea elves rather than Lovecraftian fish people. Look really busy to paint with lots of details.

2. Seraphon - Like the Idoneth, I have a lifelong interest in dinosaurs so the idea of a lizardman army with dinosaurs is quite appealing

3. Nighthaunt - I have a Vampire army for T9A so I am on the fence about having another undead army but I like the look of the models and they seem simple enough to paint for a starter list.

What would you guys suggest from these three considering I plan to get a start collecting box and begin from there? Something fun, casual but would work.

Heh. I feel like I'm giving the same advice all the time but Seraphon are currently really well supported with Start Collecting. You've got a saurus box and a skink box that gets you two big dinosaurs, a unit of cav and a unit of terradons, and two units of infantry along with some Skink Heroes out of the box. It's also easy to convert your own Astrolith Bearer etc from a spare Saurus and some bits.

Nighthaunt also seem well supported.

 BlackLobster wrote:

1. Idoneth Deepkin - I have a love of sea monsters and these guys pique my interest. Disappointed they are sea elves rather than Lovecraftian fish people. Look really busy to paint with lots of details.

 BlackLobster wrote:

2. Seraphon - Like the Idoneth, I have a lifelong interest in dinosaurs so the idea of a lizardman army with dinosaurs is quite appealing

 BlackLobster wrote:

3. Nighthaunt - I have a Vampire army for T9A so I am on the fence about having another undead army but I like the look of the models and they seem simple enough to paint for a starter list.

Of these 3? I'd go Seraphon. Why? Variety & style. + dinosaurs. Honestly you'll probably want both of the starters for this faction.
If your going to start with just one box? Then start with the one that includes the Carnosaur. Because the other one is skink based & while cool, skinks are dirt cheap pts wise, weak, & there's nowhere near enough of them in this box. You'll be at a significant disadvantage just running that skink box.

Additional thoughts:
*Idoneth - If you're not wild about elves that's a significant drawback when building an elf army.... Even more so at GW prices.
Elves on foot, elves riding sea creatures, pages of lore all about elves, elves that'll be doing the work of taking/holding objectives - this force is full of elves.
My own personal hurdle I cant seem to get past is that their sea creatures fly though the air. Yes they look cool, but they'd also just look sooo out of place on most of our tables. :(

*Nighthaunt
*Other than the Malignants box, I didn't see a start collecting box listed for them ( I might've missed it). All the other boxed sets include Stormcast opponents. That means beginning NH stuff will be coming with excess Stormcast figures. Why spend $ on figures you don't want?
And that Malignant box? That'd be a horrible beginning force.
* You say you've already got a Vampire army for another game. How does your group feel about playing AoS with non-GW models? If they're cool with it? Boom, you've already got an undead army (likely Legion of Nagash)

So Seraphon.

ccs wrote:

Of these 3? I'd go Seraphon. Why? Variety & style. + dinosaurs. Honestly you'll probably want both of the starters for this faction.
If your going to start with just one box? Then start with the one that includes the Carnosaur. Because the other one is skink based & while cool, skinks are dirt cheap pts wise, weak, & there's nowhere near enough of them in this box. You'll be at a significant disadvantage just running that skink box.

Okay. Thanks. If I did go with Seraphon I'd want the big dinosaurs for the cool factor. I have read on here that Seraphon seem a good army option. Would you agree?

ccs wrote:

*Idoneth - If you're not wild about elves that's a significant drawback when building an elf army.... Even more so at GW prices.
Elves on foot, elves riding sea creatures, pages of lore all about elves, elves that'll be doing the work of taking/holding objectives - this force is full of elves.
My own personal hurdle I cant seem to get past is that their sea creatures fly though the air. Yes they look cool, but they'd also just look sooo out of place on most of our tables. :(

It's not that they are elves but more than when I first read about them ages ago I hoped for a deep one style army. I understand your point though.

I also know what you mean about the "flying" monsters. I get the fluff behind it but yeah, it's a bit weird.

ccs wrote:

*Nighthaunt* Other than the Malignants box, I didn't see a start collecting box listed for them ( I might've missed it). All the other boxed sets include Stormcast opponents. That means beginning NH stuff will be coming with excess Stormcast figures. Why spend $ on figures you don't want?
And that Malignant box? That'd be a horrible beginning force.

I couldn't see one specific to the wraith type figures but it's an army that does interest me based on it's look. I'd have to buy it in pieces though which would probably cost me more.

ccs wrote:

* You say you've already got a Vampire army for another game. How does your group feel about playing AoS with non-GW models? If they're cool with it? Boom, you've already got an undead army (likely Legion of Nagash)

I have really thought about that and I did borrow a friends copy of the LoN book. Most would be fine but there are a couple who feel that, somehow, square bases would give me some sort of advantage. Nice guys, no grumbles from me, but it wasn't worth the arguments

 BlackLobster wrote:

ccs wrote:

Of these 3? I'd go Seraphon. Why? Variety & style. + dinosaurs. Honestly you'll probably want both of the starters for this faction.
If your going to start with just one box? Then start with the one that includes the Carnosaur. Because the other one is skink based & while cool, skinks are dirt cheap pts wise, weak, & there's nowhere near enough of them in this box. You'll be at a significant disadvantage just running that skink box.

Okay. Thanks. If I did go with Seraphon I'd want the big dinosaurs for the cool factor. I have read on here that Seraphon seem a good army option. Would you agree?

In general, yes. I don't play them myself, but a friend does. So I get to fight them, or alongside them. Good games are usually had. The dinos & big dinos are definitely the cool factor. Their troop types are effective enough (look cool as well). And their Magic phase can be really effective. I also like their terrain piece.

ccs wrote:

* You say you've already got a Vampire army for another game. How does your group feel about playing AoS with non-GW models? If they're cool with it? Boom, you've already got an undead army (likely Legion of Nagash)

I have really thought about that and I did borrow a friends copy of the LoN book. Most would be fine but there are a couple who feel that, somehow, square bases would give me some sort of advantage. Nice guys, no grumbles from me, but it wasn't worth the arguments

The problem with regards to Idoneth is that early on people misrepresented the lore and comments that had hinted at them as "Lovecraftian horror" to mean "Deep Ones".

They're soul-harvesting elves that wipe the memories of those who see them and are preceded by effectively 'bringing the sea' to the lands with them. In the lore we have of them? They're actively 'harvesting' seaside communities of humans in the Mortal Realms.

They were the stuff of nightmares and fables to humans in the Mortal Realms. And not just because the Namarti are deformed. Because they take your soul and leave you to an endless slumber. Whole coastal villages just never wake up.

I'd say Idoneth are pretty cool, same as Nighthaunt. Both are completely plastic and modern model lines which is great for a hobbyist.

Seraphon, Sarus models have not aged well, and a lot of the model line is resin/pewter.

Nighthaunt are the cheapest of the three to collect. They have some inexpensive Getting Started kits for a few of their units, and because they are in all the starter sets, you can find a lot of the models for cheap (usually). The core AOS box, is a great value for the stuff inside, even just the nighthaunt.

Idoneth are bit one-note, but have possibly the best cavalry-focused army in the game.
Nighthaunt are very weak right now, but have amazing models and are fairly easy to collect.

Seraphon have some good models (mostly big monsters) and serious stinkers in the shape of all saurus units but the carnosaur. They're not great on the tabletop and their models are ancient and were bad even back in 2001.
The best way to run Seraphon is to load up on monsters and skinks, incidentally also the best-looking of their models range.

Idoneth are a fast, elite army.
Nighthaunt are semi-fast horde army with limited ability to respawn models.

Seraphon are either incredibly mediocre saurus list, or strong army based around slann magic, big monsters and absolute bucketloads of skinks, so a mix of the other two, but with the downside of old, sometimes very bad models.

I agree about the Saurus models. Possibly the worst looking infantry models in the game. But the rest of the range is nice.

Nighthaunt has much nicer models if you like the style of an army of ghosts.

Idoneth are cool in a way but I agree they should have been Lovecraftian fish people. You could still paint them in a way to make them look creepy to be fair - dappled fishy skin tones over their eyeless faces would be quite creepy.

Thanks for the advice and suggestions everyone. Still not 100% but you've given me something good to think about.

If you're really looking at Seraphon you could always go for the Stegageddon list...